


when there was something left to save (quiet birds in circled flight remix)

by trashing-the-trashmouth (summerforbran)



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Angst, Blood and Gore, Character Death, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Post-Canon, Remix, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:20:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26625073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/summerforbran/pseuds/trashing-the-trashmouth
Summary: Richie didn’t even turn to look at Steve, he just looked at his reflection in the mirror. “Yeah. Great. Never better.” Richie’s tone was chilling, and his eyes looked flat. There was none of that mischievous spark that Steve knew so well. Steve felt a chill run down his spine as Richie stood up. “I’ll be back in a minute. Bathroom.”So many questions and emotions were swirling around in Steve’s head. It was overwhelming. He felt himself rushing to Richie’s side. “Hey… are you sure you’re up to this?” Normally, Steve wouldn’t even think about canceling a show so suddenly, but something was obviously happening to Richie. He was desperate to know what it was, and if he could help in any way.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14
Collections: Derry Remixed 2020





	when there was something left to save (quiet birds in circled flight remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [darlingargents](https://archiveofourown.org/users/darlingargents/gifts).
  * Inspired by [quiet birds in circled flight](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22841233) by [darlingargents](https://archiveofourown.org/users/darlingargents/pseuds/darlingargents). 



> My remix of darlingargents’ fic quiet birds in circled flight for Derry Remixed 2020. I’m so sorry for this. I do nothing to fix canon in this fic. Please heed the warnings and tags, especially if suicide is a trigger for you.

Richie came back to Chicago a completely different person than who he’d been before, and Steve was scared. What he was scared of, he couldn’t quite say. Richie had always been tight lipped about his personal life, to the point that Steve was almost convinced that he truly didn’t have much of a social life. It wasn’t just that, though. He knew nothing about Richie’s past before they met each other twelve years before. Richie made it a point not to talk about where he came from, and Steve had never even heard him talk about any friends from when he was younger. Even though Richie seemed careful to keep his background a secret, Steve wasn’t entirely sure that Richie understood why himself. The few times Steve had brought it up, Richie had immediately shut down. He decided long ago that he didn’t want to know what could’ve done that to Richie Tozier, of all people.

Steve had only seen Richie a handful of times since he returned from Maine nearly four months ago, but it wasn’t for a lack of trying. For the first month or so, Richie had become nearly unreachable. Most calls went straight to voicemail, and he didn’t even bother to answer e-mails. The only word that popped into Steve’s head when he finally saw him was _haunted_. Of course he knew that Richie had his fair share of problems, but this was something else entirely. Richie’s skin was pale, and he looked as though he hadn’t gotten a full night’s sleep in who knew how long. In fact, he was positive that Richie wasn’t getting much sleep. Not with the calls Richie made to him in the middle of the night at least twice a week. The first time Richie called, Steve had thought about ignoring it. What was so important that it couldn’t wait until at least the sun was up? If it wasn’t for the voice in his head urging him to pick up, he would’ve. He ended up being glad that he didn’t ignore Richie the first time, because he could tell that he wasn’t in a good place. His speech had been slurred, and he spent most of the call talking in circles. When Richie finally hung up, Steve couldn’t make himself fall asleep again. Not every conversation with Richie concerned him as much as the first one, but he never contemplated ignoring one of his calls again.

***  
Steve paced back and forth outside of Richie’s dressing room. It was Richie’s first show since he’d come back, and Steve didn’t know what to expect. He’d only gotten a brief look at Richie, he’d made a beeline to his dressing room without so much as a hello. Anxiety was taking over all of Steve’s thoughts as he stood frozen at the door, listening to the silence on the other side. Normally, he could hear Richie and his makeup artist chatting away, but there was nothing. Unable to take the silence anymore, Steve opened the door without knocking.

It was a relief to see Richie looking almost like his old self, and the makeup artist finishing up. “Fifteen minutes,” Steve announced from his spot in the doorway. “It’s been a while, Rich. Feeling okay?” He asked as he stepped further into the room, and the artist made her way past him.

Richie didn’t even turn to look at Steve, he just looked at his reflection in the mirror. “Yeah. Great. Never better.” Richie’s tone was chilling, and his eyes looked flat. There was none of that mischievous spark that Steve knew so well. Steve felt a chill run down his spine as Richie stood up. “I’ll be back in a minute. Bathroom.”

So many questions and emotions were swirling around in Steve’s head. It was overwhelming. He felt himself rushing to Richie’s side. “Hey… are you sure you’re up to this?” Normally, Steve wouldn’t even think about canceling a show so suddenly, but something was obviously happening to Richie. He was desperate to know what it was, and if he could help in any way.

“I’m fine. I have to get paid sometime, right?” Richie flashed a smile that could’ve easily been confused as a grimace.

“How about we go to dinner after this, on me? We can catch up.”

Richie nodded. “Yeah… that sounds nice. I’ll be sure to get the most expensive thing on the menu,” he joked, but his eyes were still very far away. There was no humor in them anymore. 

Steve watched Richie as he left the room, and closed the bathroom door behind him. He felt extremely small.

_Something is very wrong._

***  
Richie had been in the bathroom for over ten minutes when Steve approached the door. “Rich? Are you okay in there, buddy?” 

No answer.

Unnerved, Steve tried opening the door, but it didn’t budge. “Fuck!” He was panicking. The show was supposed to start five minutes ago, but that was the last thing on his mind. 

After a brief hesitation, Steve ran to find somebody to help him kick the door open.

***  
Steve had hoped that Richie left the bathroom by the time he got back with the sound guy, but the door was still locked. “Stand back from the door, Rich!” He called, in case Richie was standing close to where the door would burst open. Though something told him that Richie wasn’t just holed up in the bathroom because he wanted to avoid doing a show.

“You sure I can do this?” The sound guy asked. “I don’t want to lose my job, or have to pay for it.”

“Richie could be in trouble in there!” Steve snapped. He took a deep breath to calm himself down. “I’ll take the fall if anything happens. You don’t have to worry about losing your job.” He couldn’t explain the terror that was flooding his brain. He just knew that there was something wrong with Richie, and he needed to get to him.

Wordlessly, the sound guy nodded, and Steve took a couple steps back. It only took two kicks for the door to open. One for the lock, and one for the door. It was as easy as that. 

***  
For a moment, Steve stood rooted to his spot. His brain refused to believe what he was seeing. The blood caught his attention first. It had sprayed everywhere, but the smell was the worst part. It was overpowering, and he felt nauseous. He heard the sound guy gag. Though he sounded extremely far away from him, as if Steve had suddenly been submerged underwater. As though in a trance, he felt his body move towards the bathroom, and stopped at the door.

“ _Richie…_?” Steve’s voice came out small and fragile. He couldn’t make sense of the horrific scene that was laid out in front of him. At first, all he could focus on was the blood. As distressing it was, he could hardly comprehend what Richie had actually done. Even though he was seeing it with his own eyes.

Richie was slumped against a wall underneath the paper towel dispenser, his right hand still grasping the pair of scissors he’d used to stab himself in the throat. His eyes were wide opened, which made the reality of what had happened hit Steve harder than anything else. Steve’s legs buckled underneath him as the horror washed over him. Richie was gone, and there was nothing he could do. 

***  
The following week was nothing but a nightmarish blur. Steve had barely slept at all since that awful night. Any time he closed his eyes, even for a moment, all he could see was Richie’s face. He’d been on the phone constantly. If he wasn’t canceling Richie’s shows, he was making funeral preparations, or contacting various online forums to take down posts about Richie’s death. He didn’t know who had leaked the details about Richie, or why, but he wasn’t going to let that be how Richie was remembered. It made him feel sick all over again. Why would people even want to speculate? Steve would’ve done anything to erase the entire night from his mind.

Nobody needed to know the grisly details. He couldn’t even go onto his own Twitter anymore. Not when his DMs were flooded with people asking him to confirm what happened to Richie. They weren’t entitled to Richie’s pain. 

***  
The service was small. Steve knew that Richie didn’t have any family. No close friends that he was aware of. So it was on him to organize the ceremony. _I should’ve tried harder to get together with him._ If he had had any idea of the pain Richie had truly been in, he would’ve done anything in his power to help him. Or at least try to help him feel less alone. In truth, Richie’s death made it blatantly obvious that he barely knew anything about him over the years they’d worked together. Richie had kept most of himself a secret until the very end, but Steve couldn’t understand why. _Fuck… how’d I not know he was in trouble?_

Steve sniffed, and reached out to touch Richie’s urn. “Sorry I couldn’t put together something nicer for you, buddy. I did my best.” He wiped his eyes, tears flowing freely. “I’m sorry that I didn’t know what you were going through.” He turned around, and surveyed the room. He knew most of the people who had shown up. Except for a small group of people signing the guest book. Well, he knew who one of them was— Bill Denbrough. Steve didn’t invite them. He didn’t even know that Richie knew Denbrough, but he was crying… so were the three other people with him. Steve watched them until they left.

Curiously, Steve made his way to the guest book, quickly opening it to the newest page. He didn’t even notice one of the men from the group come back in.

_The Loser’s Club_

_We never could’ve done it without you, Richie. You never made us feel like losers._

_Mike Hanlon, Derry, ME  
Beverly Marsh, Manhattan, NY  
Ben Hanscom, Nebraska  
Bill Denbrough, Los Angeles, CA_

Steve furrowed his brow as he stared down at their signatures. Then it hit him: these were the people Richie had gone back to Maine to meet with. _What did they go there to do?_

The sound of somebody crying startled Steve out of his thoughts. With how quiet the room had become, Steve had nearly forgotten that he wasn’t the only person still there. He turned around, and saw a man propping a picture up against the urn. If Steve had been thinking clearly, he would’ve left the man alone, let him mourn. Obviously, he had been Richie’s friend, and the last thing Steve wanted to do was intrude on that. So he waited a few minutes until the other man looked ready to leave.

“Excuse me?” Steve asked, as he approached him. He wasn’t even sure what he wanted to say to him. Or why he felt like they needed to talk. It just felt like the only way he’d ever get closure, or be able to sleep without being haunted by his final interaction with Richie. “You were Richie’s friend?” 

The man turned, and looked at Steve quizzically. 

Steve mentally cursed himself. _I’m being so fucking selfish._ “I’m Steve… I-I was his manager,” He stammered, wanting nothing more than to just slink away. “I couldn’t find any of his close friends to send an invitation to. I’m glad you showed up for him.”

“I’m Mike.” The man held his hand out, and Steve shook it awkwardly. “I’ve known Richie since we were kids…” For a second, Steve thought that was all Mike was going to say, but he continued, “I called him a few months ago. I needed him to come back. Before then, I hadn’t seen him in nearly thirty years.” He gestured to the picture he’d placed by the urn. It showed seven kids, one of them was clearly Richie when he was much younger. They were all smiling ear to ear, and had their arms around each other. It almost looked like they never planned to let go again. Steve couldn’t shake the feeling that they had just been through something huge. “They all left Derry one by one not long after that picture was taken. There’s only four of us left now.” Mike seemed lost in his own memories as his sentence cut off.

“Are you going to be in town for a few days?” Steve asked. “If it’s okay, I want to talk to you. I’m just trying to understand.” Mike agreed, and they exchanged numbers. He left a few minutes later, once again leaving Steve alone with his thoughts.

***  
Steve showed up at Richie’s apartment a few days later. He and Mike agreed to meet there to clean it up. Nobody else was going to do it. He was a bit earlier than what they’d agreed on. He didn’t know what he was going to walk into, but he didn’t want to be taken by surprise in front of somebody he barely knew. He stood at Richie’s door for a few seconds, bracing himself. After some coaxing, he let himself in.

The apartment was cleaner than Steve thought he’d ever seen it. There were no dishes in the sink, no clothes on the floor, and the garbage was empty. The apartment’s cleanliness did nothing to comfort Steve. If anything, it was more unnerving. It almost felt like Richie had never been there at all. He found himself missing the usual clutter. Seeing the place so clean just drove home the fact that Richie was never going to stand in his kitchen and offer Steve shitty beer ever again.

An envelope with Steve’s name written in Richie’s messy handwriting was resting on the living room table. Suddenly, Steve felt as though he’d been transported back to the night of Richie’s show, staring into the bathroom in horror. His heart sank into his stomach. With shaking hands, he picked it up and opened it.

The letter contained only six words:

_The show can’t go on anymore._

Steve covered his face with both hands, and screamed.

***

It wasn’t long before Mike knocked on the door. Steve still wasn’t fully recovered from finding the letter, but he willed himself to be okay enough to talk to him. He shook his hands out, and took a shaky breath before opening the door. It was going to be an extremely long day.

They worked mostly quietly for the better part of two hours. Neither of them really knew what to say, but they were both glad for the company. It was morbid going through Richie’s belongings, and Steve felt on the verge of tears the entire time.

“I think we should take a break,” Mike announced, offering a hand out to help Steve up from his spot on the floor. 

They sat on Richie’s couch. Mike massaged his temples, struggling to think of where he would even begin. How could somebody who didn’t grow up in Derry wrap their head around what that town was like? What they’d dealt with? “I called Richie back home, because we made a promise when we were young,” Mike began. 

Steve thought back to the day Richie received Mike’s phone call. How freaked out he’d been, and how he’d come back irreversibly changed. “Richie never talked about when he was a kid. I don’t think he even said he was from Maine until you called him,” Steve said. 

“He didn’t remember. Nobody who left Derry remembered. So I had to stay all those years,” Mike answered. “Hell, _you_ could’ve visited or just driven through, and you wouldn’t remember. Or you’d have only the foggiest memory of it.”

“I don’t understand.”

“There was something evil in Derry. We dealt with it when we were kids, and we survived. We had to finish the job. That’s why I called him back.”

“You’re not really making sense…” Steve was trying, but it was as if Mike was talking in code. He couldn’t figure out what he was trying to say. “What did you survive?”

Mike sighed. “You really don’t want to know, trust me.” He decided that was the best answer. What was the point in letting him know that his scariest childhood nightmare had been very real, and had lived underneath Derry for millions of years? It would’ve hunted Steve too if he’d grown up in that god forsaken town. “All seven of us were supposed to go back, but Stan never made it back to us.”

Steve would’ve argued, but he had a feeling that wouldn’t have gotten him anywhere. He didn’t want to risk Mike changing his mind and deciding not to talk to him, either. He glanced down at his hands, taking in what he’d just been told. 

“We did what we needed to do this time, but we lost two of our friends in the process.” Mike’s eyes took on the same quality that Richie’s had the last time Steve had seen him alive. That horrible haunted look. 

Steve reached out to touch his shoulder. “Mike?” 

Mike shook his head, snapping himself out of it. “Sorry.”

“Hold on,” Steve got up, and went to the kitchen. He came back with a glass of water, and handed it to Mike. “Take your time.”

“Thank you.” Mike drank the entire glass before speaking again. “We had a friend, his name was Eddie. He saved Richie’s life.” Mike’s eyes met Steve’s, begging him to understand what he was about to say. “He saved Richie, but he didn’t make it. He died in Richie’s arms. We couldn’t give him a proper burial… Richie didn’t want to leave him.”

“Jesus Christ.” Steve recoiled. “Did… did you go to the cops?”

Mike shook his head. “There was nothing the cops would’ve been able to do.” He took a deep breath, before breaking out into sobs. “I thought Richie was going to be okay when he left.”

Steve wrapped an arm around his shoulders, and held him like that. “It’s not your fault. It sounds like you did what you needed to do. Thank you… for everything you did for him.”

***  
When they were finished, Steve walked Mike out to his car. “I have something for you.” He went back to his car, and came back carrying Richie’s urn and the picture Mike had brought to the service. “I was going to keep his ashes, but I think he’d prefer to be with his friends.”

Mike’s eyes widened, and he reached out without hesitation. “Thank you, Steve.” He hugged the urn to his chest. 

Steve gave him a sad smile, and nodded. “I think he’d haunt me for the rest of my life otherwise.”

Mike laughed. “Yeah. He probably would,” he agreed, wiping his eyes. 

They talked for a few more minutes, but it was time for Mike to go. Steve watched as he drove away, feeling lighter than he had in over a week. His heart didn’t hurt quite as much. Though he knew that he’d never know exactly what Richie had gone through, he finally felt like he could start to heal, and he hoped Mike could too.


End file.
